


Metaphors

by Lokomotiv



Category: Scorpion (TV 2014)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-13
Updated: 2016-09-13
Packaged: 2018-08-14 22:00:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8030380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lokomotiv/pseuds/Lokomotiv
Summary: Walter likes metaphors. He’s not good at them, so he rarely use them, but he likes them. They remind him of his sister.





	Metaphors

**Author's Note:**

> I've only watched Season 1 of Scorpion, so anything happening later is (obviously) not taken into account in this fic.

 

 

> _I felt like she was being beaten, and I was handcuffed._
> 
> Walter (S01E02)

 

 

Walter likes metaphors. He’s not good at them, because except for his lack of empathy, his tendency to interpret everything literally is the most prominent indicator of the mild autism he’s been diagnosed with. But he likes them, always has, ever since he understood that they exist, and he’s collected them ever since. He never uses them though. He takes them and remembers them, but changes them into similes before letting them leave his mouth, because that’s as far as he’s willing to stretch accuracy.

They remind him of his sister, because she was the one who introduced him to the concept many years ago. He’d snuck into her room one night when she was sick, just to sit by her side as she slept, but she was awake. Without warning and without knowing why, he’d started to cry. She’d helped him understand that what he was feeling was okay, that just because he rarely felt bad because someone else was hurting didn’t mean he couldn’t, or shouldn’t.

“What you’re feeling now, that’s how I feel when Dad hits you."

“But nobody’s hitting you."

“It’s a metaphor, silly."

“What’s that?"

“It’s when you say something is like something else that it’s not really, but almost."

That wasn’t, of course, an accurate definition of a metaphor, which he’d realized and as soon as he read up on the subject the next morning. He’d never told her that though.

“Why would you do that? Why not just say what it actually is?"

“It helps you understand."

“How?"

“You feel something, right? You feel like that when I’m sick, but that doesn’t help either of us understand what that’s like. So if I say it’s like I feel when something else happens, then we understand each other better."

“Oh, okay. But Dad never hits you. Besides, if he did I’d stop him."

“I know. But it’s a metaphor."

“Hm. Okay, how’s this: it feels like you’re being beaten, and I’m handcuffed."

“That’s good! See, now we understand each other better."

“All right."

“Do you feel better?"

“Yeah."

He’d never actually felt that metaphors had helped him understand anything. In fact, he found the use of them confusing, because there was no way to tell where they began and where they ended. But he accepted that some people apparently found them helpful in some way, because his sister had told them that they did. He took her word for it, like he did for so many other things.

As for that specific simile, he’d never said those words aloud again since that first night, not until now. He’d never forgotten them of course - he couldn’t, really - and he’d sometimes in his mind applied them to situations in his life. And of course they applied, every day and all the time, to Megan’s MS, and the fact that he _still_ couldn’t _solve_ her _problem_.


End file.
